Oil and gas lifer jumps ship to wave and solar energy

Stephen Rogers has made the break from Oil and Gas to the sunny uplands of renewable energy, becoming the chief executive of Protean Energy, a former miner trying to commercialise proprietary wave energy technology.

"I developed an interest in renewable energy technology over a period of time as I started to realise how many tonnes of carbon dioxide and noxious gases are produced in industry around the world," Rogers, 61, tells The Australian Financial Review.

"I am not someone who enters into long debates about climate science but I do recognise that we are polluting the earth and that the level of respiratory diseases and related diseases is increasing and we have got to do something about it." Renewable energy investment has now topped spending on new fossil fuel power plants, and installed capacity exceeds coal, according to the International Energy Agency. Rogers' conversion came a decade after former BP Australia chief Greg Bourne made his startling leap from the oil patch to running the WorldWide Fund for Nature, and after a year of milestones for clean energy.

Protean aims to produce wave energy for less than the 50¢-$1 a kilowatt hour it can cost remote communities and islands to generate power from diesel and solar, and target ecotourism and agriculture.

"It's really about shaping the business to match the emerging renewable energy industry."